


A Sexual Awakening in Five Acts

by featherxquill



Category: Sanctuary (TV)
Genre: 19th Century, 20th Century, 21st Century, F/F, F/M, Female Sexuality, Interspecies Sex, Minor Character Death, POV Female Character, World War II, five things, sexual journey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-22
Updated: 2013-11-22
Packaged: 2018-01-02 08:50:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 20,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1054840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/featherxquill/pseuds/featherxquill
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four times Helen Magnus learned about herself through sex, and one time she didn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is quite possibly the longest ‘five things’ fic ever written *g*. Many thanks to Arwen for cheerleading me through it, to BecauseHerFace for her thoughtful feedback and encouragement, and to Katie, as always, for the edit. My love to you all ♥

**1886**

Sex, Helen Magnus thinks, or the choice not to have it, is sometimes a political act. 

She thinks this as she stands on the balcony outside her bedroom and watches the sun go down over Oxford, silhouetting the cathedral spires and the dome of the Radcliffe library in a brilliant orange glow. She wonders what this view will look like to her tomorrow. Will she be irrevocably changed, her senses altered? Despite all her careful testing, she can’t even be absolutely certain that she will be alive.

Her hands curl around the balcony’s rail. The wrought iron is cool to the touch, and she lets the feel of it anchor her in the physical moment, countering the nebulous sense of _something_ —fear, exhilaration, energy—that wells up in her chest with the thought of the journey she is about to embark on. Tomorrow, after months of work, she will make her mark on scientific history. As a visionary or a fool, only time will tell, but for better or worse, tomorrow she will become the first person in history to inject herself with a serum derived from vampire blood. The results, she suspects, from her tests on rats and mice, will be dramatic. What the serum will do to human physiology, however, she cannot know.

Nevertheless, she is determined that it will be _she_ who injects the serum first, though she expects that all four of the men will offer to take her place, considering it nothing less than their chivalric duty.

Duty. Chivalry. And if she allows it, if Nikola Tesla or James Watson takes the first dose and the experiment is successful, when the historic breakthrough is documented for future generations, Helen knows that her own name will become nothing more than a footnote in history; the female assistant to their daring and brilliance.

All four of the men have become as dear to her as brothers—dearer, at least in John’s case—but Helen knows that none of them can truly fathom how significant tomorrow will be for her. Although they know about the years she spent as a nurse before she was finally able to attend medical school, although they know that her attempt to practise in Oxford failed because the idea of a female physician was met with distrust, although they know that Oxford will not allow her to enrol, despite the fact that she is as clever and passionate as they are, none of them—not even Nikola, whose humble beginnings and thick accent mark him as different in a town like this one—fully comprehend what an important moment tomorrow will be for her. For women in science. Helen knows she has been blessed, with a wealthy and supportive family, with acceptance and mentoring from the women who came to the medical profession before her. Tomorrow is her chance to vindicate that support and encouragement, and to pave the road for women who may wish to walk it in future.

Helen believes in science. She believes in rational thought and the education of women. She believes in a woman’s right to own property, and universal suffrage, and that her primary value is her brain and not her virtue.

And yet she is thirty-six years old, has been engaged to be married for two years, and has never known the touch of a man. Despite the way she has railed against, flouted or simply ignored the restrictions her society would place on her because of her sex, remaining virtuous is the one rule she has never broken. At first, she held fast to it because it was mandated—the boarding houses she lived in while training as a nurse, and later a doctor, strictly forbade male guests in women’s rooms, and Helen had fought too hard for her education to throw it away for something as paltry as romantic dalliance. Later, though, once she moved home to Oxford, it became something different. She had gained the respect of her four research partners because of her knowledge of and experience with the bizarre. They had come to see her not as a woman, but as a like-mind, a fellow scientist. She did not lose their respect when she began walking out with John, or even when they became engaged, but somehow, Helen felt that if she allowed him to bed her, James and Nikola and Nigel would certainly see the change it would cause in her, and she would be reduced in their eyes to a woman once again, a conquered thing.

And so Helen made a choice: to be educated, respected and virtuous until marriage. She made a choice to be seen not as a woman, but as a mind. Now, though, on the eve of the Five’s grand experiment, she wonders why she shouldn’t be both. By failing to challenge the idea that she cannot be taken seriously as a scientist if she is also seen as a woman, is she not accepting that her womanhood makes her inferior? Is she not agreeing that her true value lies in her virtue, in her worth as an object to be possessed by a man? And does that not go against everything she believes?

No more. Tomorrow will be a day for pushing boundaries. Let tonight be the same.

Helen stands, silent and still, for several more minutes, as the last rays of sun bleed out of the sky and the night air falls coolly onto her skin. That nameless something that rises in her when she thinks of tomorrow is still present, but it is quieter now, dampened by the conviction that has steadied her. She breathes the evening air in deep; it tastes mellow and fresh.

A muffled knock comes on the door inside, and a moment later, it squeaks open.

“Helen?”

John's voice. She turns, pushing aside the sheer curtain and stepping back into the room.

“John.”

He smiles when he sees her, but he looks slightly bemused. “You sent for me?” he asks. “I must say, Mrs Lyons seemed rather perturbed by your request that I be sent to your room directly. You don't look unwell. Is everything all right?”

“Everything’s fine,” Helen says, but she is suddenly uncertain, not of her convictions, but of how to proceed. How to make her desire known? How can she put all the thoughts in her head into words that will mean the things she wants them to mean? It sounds dreadfully prosaic: _I want to go to bed with you because society tells me I shouldn’t_ or _because this might be the last night of our lives, if everything goes horribly wrong_ , but it’s more than that. More than she can possibly say, perhaps more than she even fully understands.

They stand there for several moments, a palpable silence stretching between them, until Helen steps forward, foregoing words for actions. She moves close to John, reaches up to curl a hand around his neck, and pulls him down into a passionate kiss. Her fingers tangle into his hair as his hand lands jerkily on her waist, and when they break apart, his eyes open wide. He is so shocked that his mouth forgets to close.

“Helen?” He frames her name as a question, as though he is wondering if this woman in front of him is her at all. Helen is not usually so forward.

She doesn't release her hold on him, slips her hand around so her palm cups his cheek. “Make love to me, John,” she whispers. “I don't want to wait any longer.”

His eyes are still wide with surprise, but now they turn serious. Thoughtful. His gaze searches hers, studies her face, and she can see his mind working, can see him taking in her stance and the set of her jaw and working out what she must be thinking. He knows how momentous a decision this is for her, knows the implications, but he also knows what tomorrow holds for them, and she can see the understanding blossoming behind his eyes. He doesn't protest, doesn't pull away, doesn’t try to make her decisions for her. Instead, when he speaks, it is merely to ask, in the gravest of voices:

“Are you sure?”

Helen laughs. “John, have you ever known me to do something I wasn't sure of, however reckless it might be? Or to go back on a decision, once made?”

At that, John smiles. It's a feline expression, almost predatory. “Never,” he says. “And far be it for me to question the indomitable Helen Magnus, soon to be known to the world as great.”

His hand is steady on her hip now, and with those words he slides it around to the small of her back and tugs her closer to him. This time, when he leans down to claim her mouth with his, his kiss is confident and full of an unmistakable heat. He has so much confidence in her, trusts her to lead him into the unknown tomorrow without even the smallest doubt, and his belief washes her own concerns away. Lets her believe they might even succeed, make history. _Yes_ , she thinks, arching into his touch and tangling herself around him. Tomorrow she will belong to the world, but tonight she has chosen to give herself only to him.

~*~


	2. Chapter 2

**1913**

Sex, Helen Magnus thinks, can be different things to different people, and sometimes, the process of communication, of two people discovering what it will be between them, can be rather fun.

She thinks this as a feminine, distinctly non-human hand slips between her legs, and her mind explodes with images.

*

The first time Helen met the mermaid who would later be nicknamed 'Sally' was on the night the Titanic sunk. It's a night she, like most people who survived it, would rather forget—all those screams and frozen faces, people that no medicine could save—but she forces herself to remember it because it is such a striking example of human folly, and the benevolence of those that humanity would so often refer to as monsters.

She remembers clinging to the ship as it went down, holding on until her fingers would no longer grip, then falling, plunging into icy, churning water, so dark that she lost all sense of direction. So cold that she knew, even as she kicked her legs and tried to fathom which way was up, that her chances of being rescued before hypothermia set in were virtually non-existent. She remembers her lungs paradoxically burning, desperate for air, and kicking frantically in her heavy skirts, attempting to swim in any direction, hoping that whichever she chose would be up. When a pair of hands closed around her arms, her first reaction was terror—another survivor clinging to life yet dooming them both—but a moment later, her mind filled with images of the inky night sky, of lifeboats pushing through teeming bodies. The hands tugged her, and somehow, despite the horror of the image, she knew that she was being pulled toward the surface.

When she broke through, she remembers gasping a breath of air that was as icy cold as the water, and bobbing there in her life jacket, unable to swim another inch. It was then that she realised that the hands hadn't left, that they were attached to a pair of arms that were wrapped around her below the surface, and that, while far from being warm, the body curled around her was nowhere near as cold as the icy water or the frigid air that turned her eyelashes to snow.

Helen doesn’t know how long she was in the water that night. She never saw her rescuer, but the creature—for Helen was certain that was what it was; a human body could not possibly have been so unaffected by the freezing temperature—stayed with her, and she drifted in and out of consciousness, her mind full of disjointed images, sometimes soothing and sometimes jarring her alert. The last of these, like a sharp jab in the side, came just before her rescuer vanished, as the beam of a searchlight passed over her face. Moments later, different hands were reaching out for her, tugging her from the water. She heard the unmistakable voice of Maggie Brown exclaim, “Good heavens, it’s Miss Magnus!” She doesn’t remember much after that.

In the days that followed, Helen at first thought that she must have imagined that unseen presence, that the odds were too unlikely and that it must have been her Abnormally slow metabolism that kept her alive, but then she heard other, similar stories, whispered across the decks of _Carpathia_. Others who had been rescued from the water that night reported guardian angels and departed loved ones reaching out to them, tugging them to the surface when all seemed lost, and remaining with them, keeping them just this side of freezing until help arrived. Helen, of course, dismissed the ghost aspect of the stories as superstitious nonsense, but she did wonder what Abnormal creatures would perform such selfless acts. In her research into Abnormal life, she had come across stories that confirmed the existence of mermaids—and had she felt something tugging at her skirts as she floated in the water, like the tail of a scaly thing, or was that hallucination? Surely her legs would have been too numb to feel anything—but she knew next to nothing of their culture, and all the accounts she’d read had placed their habitats in much warmer waters.

Helen didn’t discover the identity of her rescuer until over a year later. She had been in the Americas for fifteen months, and was in the process of converting the church in Old City into a new Sanctuary, when she woke one night, full of terror. Images of deep water flooded her mind, and the sense of danger and pursuit was so strong that she searched her bedroom from top to bottom, heart beating hard. She waited for the nightmare to pass, but although she was wide awake by the time she’d finished her search, the fear remained. Something was hunting, but... it wasn't hunting her? Helen didn't know precisely how she knew that, but as soon as she thought it, she felt sure that it was true. This fear, the feeling of pursuit, it belonged to someone else. Was there an empath nearby?

Helen didn’t sleep again that night. She paced her room, got dressed. She made tea and drank it in the half-demolished kitchen, staring at the hole in the wall that would be coming down, and the open tool box beside it that spoke of a job hastily started then left for the next day. Helen's contractors worked long hours, from 8 'til 7, and she was adamant that they leave at finishing time. Not everyone had an eternity to live. Once she'd drained her tea, she picked up a hammer.

The flashes came again as she was knocking out the wall, images of water and a looming presence. The panic came with it, and it took Helen a moment to fight it down, to separate the sense of swimming away from something from her own physicality, kneeling on the floor of the kitchen with wood chips in her hair and the hammer clenched in her fist. 

This was not like an empath. She'd met some empaths who had the ability to project their emotions, but when they did, their feelings were always indistinguishable from one's own. It was only when a person left their vicinity that they realised that what they had been feeling was gone, a projection. Which meant, of course, that they tended to have a short range; the ability was an evolutionary defence to confuse and disorient predators. This was something different, more like a distress signal, a call for help. Which meant that it was targeted—it had to be, otherwise one could well end up being hunted by more than one predator.

What creature could be specifically targeting her mind? Helen had never treated anything with this ability before. But it did feel...familiar, somehow. Images, not language. Water. Ideas that she understood, but without really knowing how. It was like... like that night when she was flailing in the North Atlantic, and something grabbed her, and she saw the night sky in her mind's eye and knew that she was being guided to the surface.

It wasn't empathy, not really. It wasn't projection but communication, from a creature that lived underwater and thus had no spoken language but rather the ability to communicate with others telepathically. Perhaps it could even communicate at great distance with a mind it had touched once before.

When the call came again, Helen answered.

*

The mermaid is beautiful, Helen thinks, when the creature is lowered into her new habitat and her tail unfurls in a shimmer of blue and green. They found her off the coast of North Carolina, fleeing from that nameless terror, and she came to Helen willingly, spending a week in the swimming pool of a rented Florida holiday home before being transferred to her newly constructed tank. She is the Old City Sanctuary's first resident.

She orients herself in her new environment, turning this way and that, and then her eyes land on Helen, standing in front of the tank, and she swims toward her, gliding to a stop before the glass wall and floating there, surveying Helen with a look of frank curiosity. Her hand, green-tinged and webbed to the knuckles, lifts up to touch the glass in front of her, and then Helen feels the strange sensation of a mind brushing against her own. This close, it's almost physical, and this time it's tentative, as if the mermaid is seeking permission now that the situation is not so dire. Helen smiles, lifting her own hand to place it against the glass, and nods. She doesn't know if the mermaid understands the gesture explicitly, but she seems to understand Helen's body language as a whole, because a moment later, the mermaid's consciousness slips into hers.

They spend some time just like that, adjusting to the alien sensations of each other's minds, feeling each other out. Like before, the first comprehensible things that pass between them are emotions: Helen feels a sense of safety and gratitude coming from the mermaid, and she tries to convey warmth and welcome in return. She feels strange thinking of her new resident as ‘the mermaid,’ though, so she attempts an introduction. _I'm Helen_ , she thinks, gesturing to herself. Confusion comes through from the mermaid, mirrored in the expression on her face. 

Language doesn’t work. Helen suspects the very idea of _words_ is alien to the mermaid, which is certainly difficult for her to understand. Even so, they’ve managed to communicate basic feelings, so surely it is possible to share more abstract concepts. She just has to learn to think differently.

Helen imagines her own face as she sees it in the mirror, then her mother holding an infant. _Helen,_ she imagines her mother saying, then thinks of the meaning of her name, a burning torch, a ball of light. “Helen.” She says the word aloud this time, although she is not sure whether the mermaid can hear her through the thick glass. Even if she can, the sound will surely be distorted by the water, but perhaps it will help her to understand the way that humans communicate.

This time, there is recognition. Pleasure and eagerness slide along the bond between them, and the mermaid sends her similar images: a family with young. She lacks the perception of her own reflection, but she mirrors Helen’s gesture, pointing to herself, and in the next moment, a series of perceptions come to Helen’s mind: a rocky gully, the current of water pulled through it by a wave, and something else, like a sound—a harmony created by the movement of water through the chasm. If Helen had to put it into words, she might render it as something akin to “WaveSong.”

Helen smiles. She remembers something her father once said to her: _“If you could teach a lion to speak, you still wouldn’t understand it.”_. He was right, she thinks, in many ways, but perhaps, if you taught yourself to roar...

*

Helen visits WaveSong every day. Apart from the contractors, Helen is alone in her new Sanctuary; she'll hire permanent staff once the place is finished. It can feel rather lonely being the only person in such a vast building, so she is grateful for the mermaid's company, and for the intellectual challenge that learning to communicate with her presents. It is difficult, at first—after the introductions, Helen finds that the questions she has are rather abstract, like wanting to know about the lives and culture of WaveSong's species, and why she chose to leave them. Helen wants to run tests on WaveSong's blood and study her physiology, but she doesn't want to do it without consent, because the mermaid is clearly capable of reasoned decisions, and none of these things lend themselves to the rudimentary communication they have established between them. She persists, though, and little by little they begin to understand each other. Helen learns to represent complex ideas through image and emotion, and WaveSong begins to connect images to the English words they are associated with. It's an imperfect translation, and Helen suspects it is specific to them—Helen's mental associations, after all, are particular to her consciousness and experiences and may not be understood by any other human—but over time she learns that the mermaid population is rather small, that their society is matriarchal, largely pacifist and benevolent to the point of self-sacrifice, and that WaveSong was cast out, peacefully but permanently, by the elders of her tribe, for refusing to perform an act of assistance that could have caused great harm to her. In turn, Helen communicates what she can of the vastness and diversity of human culture, its creativity and ferocity.

 _How do you reproduce?_ Helen asks one day, in a mishmash of words and images related to sex, pregnancy and childbirth. _What sorts of families do you have?_ An image of her own, mother and father and daughter, a unit distinct from the rest of society, while still existing as part of the larger group.

Similar, is the response Helen gets, though sometimes larger, with more adults, two females and one male, or more than one of each, or sometimes two or more of the same sex raising young. Reproduction happens by the laying of eggs by one or more female, fertilized by one or more male. The resulting offspring could be raised by any family group who had fewer infants than others.

 _But what,_ WaveSong asks, attempting words, is the image Helen provided of human copulation? She seems rather amused by the idea of two bodies so intimately wrapped in each other.

 _Intercourse,_ Helen thinks, drawing links between the fertilization of eggs laid and the act between humans. She conveys concepts of desire and pleasure, and sometimes love, and asks if mermaids have a way of connecting similarly.

The response is affirmative, but the rush of images that follow it are far too abstract for Helen to make sense of. She seeks clarification, but WaveSong seems unable to provide any. The sense of amusement and playfulness is still with her, though, and Helen understands her next thought quite clearly: _Come in here with me, and I'll show you._

The water is cool when Helen slides into it, naked. It's just shy of too cold, actually, and Helen feels her body respond to the temperature shift, nipples hardening and skin rising to gooseflesh. Taking a deep breath, she submerges herself, opening her eyes once she's under and taking in the sight of the tank from the inside. Rocks and sea-plants surround her and small fish dart in and out. These comprise the bulk of WaveSong's diet: she cultivates the plants and only eats the fish sustainably, and is provided with supplementary food when necessary. Through the glass at the front of the tank, Helen can see the main lab of the Sanctuary, blurry and indistinct, but it only holds her attention for a moment, because WaveSong is swimming toward her the next.

Up close, her alien beauty is even more apparent than it is through the glass. Her hair is coarse and red, suspended in the water around her head like a halo. Her green-tinged skin carries the suggestion of scales in certain places—elbows, breasts, and upon her neck, where a row of gills flex open and closed—and in those places it shimmers like her tail, tiny webs of iridescent sparkle. Her eyes are dark, deep like the ocean; they barely have any whites at all. She studies Helen just as intently, and they swim around each other, WaveSong graceful and Helen feeling ungainly, all limbs and kicking. WaveSong doesn't seem to find her amusing, though. Instead, she is full of fascination at the way the air in Helen's lungs attempt to pull her to the surface, at the expanse of pale skin on display that the mermaid has never seen before, since it is always covered up by Helen's blouses and long skirts. She stares in wonder at Helen's legs and feet, and reaches out to touch the smooth skin of her hip, where her own body begins to transition to scaly tail.

Helen surfaces for air and dives back down, somersaults in the water, feeling WaveSong’s amusement as she does the same. The swish of her tail buffets Helen with a wave of current. Helen reaches out and touches WaveSong’s arm, feels the skin-that-is-almost-scales, and marvels at the differences between them, when compared with their similarities. WaveSong has breasts, but she does not have nipples—the form is there but the function is gone, and Helen thinks it remarkable that they share so much of the same physical appearance for species that must have diverged from each other so long ago in their evolution.

Helen senses amusement again, and WaveSong suggests that she is too clinical, that she should stop studying and start enjoying. _I like..._ the image of Helen’s legs comes through, then WaveSong asks her what the humans do. Rising to the challenge, Helen swims forward, cups her hand around the mermaid’s chin and pulls her in for a kiss. Her lips are cool, but soft, and when Helen pulls away, she takes a moment to enjoy the sensation of surprised enjoyment coming from WaveSong, but then she has to surface again for more air. She can see that this particular difference in their physiology is going to be problematic.

 _Not so much,_ WaveSong sends her a moment later, surfacing along with Helen. Her head is above the water but her gills remain submerged, and when she wraps an arm around Helen's waist, Helen finds that she does not need to kick to stay afloat, that that powerful tail is enough for both of them.

WaveSong asks her again what the humans do to bring pleasure. Obviously, she lacks the human organs that feature in Helen's explanation, but is there anything she can do? Helen responds in the affirmative, imagining the things she likes, acts performed by John and subsequent lovers that will not be impeded by the water.

WaveSong is curious and thoughtful when she reaches out to caress Helen's breast. Her hand slides around it, cupping the buoyant mass, and then her thumb slips over Helen's nipple, circling and flicking like Helen showed her. Helen lets a purr form in her throat, lets her mind fill with the warm, curling pleasure the sensation creates. WaveSong seems to enjoy both the projected feeling and the sound that goes with it. She expresses fascination at the way human beings are able to vocalise abstract feeling so accurately.

 _Now who's being clinical,_ Helen thinks, amused. WaveSong silences the thought by repeating her action, this time rolling Helen's nipple between finger and thumb. Helen bites her lip.

She questions WaveSong again about what the mermaids do, and now WaveSong turns serious. _You will be_ , and here images that Helen interprets to mean opened, in the mind, or bared. _Permission?_

The thought gives Helen pause. Her mind laid open, her innermost thoughts on display? Although they have been communicating mind to mind for months, Helen has always had the sense that WaveSong was only touching the surface, that her secrets were still safely locked away in the depths of her consciousness. The thought of letting someone into them, Helen finds, frightens her. She doesn’t know when that happened. She wasn’t always this way, keeping things close and guarding herself. Was it after John’s betrayal that she started doing that? Or was it a more gradual process that began as the people she loved drifted away and began to grow old, and she realised that she would eventually have to watch countless people die while she went on living? Helen doesn’t know, but now that she is aware of it she feels a desperate need for connection and understanding, and so she pushes past the fear and sends the mermaid her consent.

WaveSong senses Helen’s hesitancy but accepts her decision, and a moment later, her mind moves deeper into Helen's, through and around as her hand slides down over Helen's stomach to slip between her thighs. Her fingers find Helen's clitoris, aided by the explicit instructional thoughts Helen provides, and when she begins to stroke it, drawing circles with steady pressure, she lets loose the full power of her telepathy, and Helen's mind erupts.

They're falling, tumbling deep into each other's consciousnesses, swimming and gliding. Helen hatches from an egg, swishing her fledgling tail to break the liquid membrane she's encased in. WaveSong is born, squalling and bloody, into a frosty English morning. WaveSong runs through a sunlit meadow, collecting insects in the heather, and Helen explores underwater caves, jabbing at the squishy creatures that live in its crevices with a squeamish finger. Helen feels the ache of exclusion from her society, WaveSong the pain of discovering the man she loves is a murderer. These and a thousand more images from lives full of joy and hurt, generosity and pride and secrets. Some come in colourful flashes, others play out in what seems like real time. Others still are simply feelings, urgent or languid, but filling them up with each other until it's hard to distinguish one from the other. And then they are together again, here in this water with WaveSong's tail beating to keep them afloat and her hand working between Helen's legs, and Helen is rising, arching in WaveSong's arms as she comes with a strangled cry. The force of her orgasm rocks both of them, wrapped as they are in each other's minds, and when she comes back they are both trembling and dazed.

Helen's body, flushed with warmth from her climax, feels suddenly cold in the water. She shivers, and WaveSong pulls her closer, curling a second arm around her waist, floating there with her and shielding her from the worst of the cold, just as she had on the night they met, all those months ago.

Their minds are silent now, have slipped apart exhausted, but after a time, Helen feels WaveSong's consciousness touch hers again, though it feels tired and more fragile than usual. What the humans have, she conveys, letting an echo of Helen's orgasm flicker through her mind, is quite...and here Helen gets the sense of namelessness, a struggle to define.

 _Something_ , Helen supplies, having a word for that that is more apt than the feeling. _Quite something, yes. Yours is, too_.

They stay like that, suspended in the water, mindless with exhaustion but knowing each other completely, for quite a long time.

~*~


	3. Chapter 3

**1946**

Sex, Helen Magnus thinks, is sometimes a mistake.

She thinks this as she sits on the edge of James Watson’s bed, its white sheets half-curled around her naked body, and stares at the back of his head.

*

It felt like the most natural thing in the world, when it first began. Helen had loved James for a long time, perhaps as long as she had loved John. They’d worked together many times, from hunting the Ripper—and James had felt that betrayal as keenly as Helen had, albeit in a different way—to tending Abnormals. James had helped her run the London Sanctuary after her father’s death, and he’d been the one to encourage her to set sail for America two years later, willing to take charge of the place so Helen could escape and carve herself a new life. They’d kept in contact when the Old City Sanctuary was opened, and coordinated retrievals of Abnormals from around the world. During the Great War, they’d thrown their doors open wide, providing refuge to the many creatures displaced by the carnage that swept Europe. Before the war was over, they’d had to open a new facility to cope with the numbers, and James had been instrumental in securing a location in Moscow and recruiting a crew to run it, travel being what it was at that time: slow, difficult and dangerous.

When the Second World War began and it became apparent that the Axis powers knew of the existence of Abnormals and were not averse to using them, Helen and James, along with Nikola and Nigel, were recruited by the Allied forces. They were trained in weapons and combat, taught to pilot planes and drive tanks, and lived and worked in very close quarters, almost like they had all those years ago at Oxford. When their training was complete, they were put to work. For Nikola, this meant working from London, designing technology that could be used against the enemy. For Helen, James and Nigel, it meant being sent out into the field to capture or neutralise Abnormals in the employ of their foe.

They were considered special operatives, but they spent plenty of time among the troops, so Helen saw the horrors of the war firsthand. She treated men riddled with bullet wounds, with burns from phosphorus grenades turned septic, and, on a mission to China, witnessed the devastating effects of mustard gas and Lewisite. She remembers field hospitals full of beds with tented white sheets, erected that way because the wounded soldiers, covered in angry, puss-filled blisters, could not bear even the slightest touch against their skin. They were hunting Abnormals, but Helen did wonder what the creatures could possibly do that was more monstrous than what human beings could do to each other.

She found out, of course. In May of 1940, they found themselves in France as it fell to the Nazis. By day, battle was traditional—guns firing and bombs falling overhead, bad enough—but after night fell, the Nazis released their dogs. These were Abnormal hybrids, with thick hides that acted as body armour, making them impervious to all but the heaviest ordnance. Although neither of the species they were bred from were ordinarily vicious, this variety was bloodthirsty and intelligent enough to be trained to only attack the enemy. Their jaws were enormous, their bites devastating. They fed primarily on rotting meat—dead soldiers, Helen suspected—so their mouths were infested with deadly bacteria that inevitably infected even the healthiest men.

Night was when Helen and James worked, Nigel not being with them on that mission; he had been put to work against an enemy whose sense of smell did not render his talent useless. They would load their guns with their deadliest ammunition and set traps from which the creatures could be safely dispatched, luring them with meat, herding them with fire, trying to keep the Allied troops safe. Sometimes they managed it; other times they did not.

One night they were chasing four of the beasts toward a preset snare, both of them brandishing flaming torches and shouting. As they neared the trap, one of the creatures veered off from the pack toward where the troops were camped. Helen was closer.

"I'll follow," she called, running up close to James to pass him the torch she carried. "Can you herd these others alone?"

"Of course," James panted. "Go!"

With one last look at the pack they were chasing, Helen sprinted off into the trees in pursuit of the renegade. As she ran, she unholstered her weapon, listening to the beast crashing through the undergrowth and following as closely as she could.

She judged that they were still some distance from the camp—the trees were thinner here, although the camp lay a considerable way from their edge—but a moment later she heard a snarl rip through the night, followed by an exclamation of surprise, a gunshot, and a scream that cut off abruptly.

Helen burst through the treeline in time to find the creature on top of a soldier. The man was clearly a lookout, stationed outside the camp. He hadn't had time to raise the alarm. That was good. The last thing she needed was an entire battalion catching sight of this creature.

Helen sprinted forward, waiting until she was close before she fired her weapon. The bullet scraped the creature’s back but didn't penetrate. It was enough to get its attention, though. Snarling, it turned, abandoning its prey to charge at her instead. It was as big as a wolf, muzzle bloody and teeth bared. Helen waited until it was within arm’s length of her before she emptied a full clip into its face. It fell back, twitching, and died.

Helen rushed forward to where the soldier lay fallen. He'd curled protectively onto his side after the beast let go of him and now lay moaning quietly, one hand clutched to his gut. He flinched when Helen touched his shoulder.

"It's all right," she said, letting her English accent reassure him, "I'm a doctor." She repeated the words in French, just in case. Gently, she rolled him onto his back so that she could inspect his wounds.

His eyes were glazed with pain, his hands bloody. There was a hole in his side almost a hands breadth in diameter, a mess of blood and tattered fabric that his entrails were protruding from.

"How...bad is it?" He spoke English, his voice was hoarse; the words grated out with effort.

Helen took a deep breath that rattled heavily in her chest. If this were a normal wound, and immediate treatment available, this man might live. As it was, however...the creature had bitten into his internal organs with its filthy mouth; there was little left for him but a slow, painful death.

She couldn't lie to him.

"Not good," she said.

"Will I...live?" he asked, but already sounded devoid of hope.

"It's unlikely," Helen answered. "The creature-" But he didn't need to know about that now.

He lay there, silent, for several moments. His eyes closed, and Helen thought he was losing  
consciousness. But then he spoke again.

"Finish it," he said, voice stronger than it had been moments ago. "Please. Don't want it to be...slow."

Helen closed her own eyes, took another deep breath. She didn’t know if she could. She’d taken an oath when she became a physician, swearing never to do harm to a person. It was an oath she believed in, that she’d personally expanded to include Abnormals, except in cases where her own life was at risk. But this war, the things she’d seen... When everything was chaos, when humankind did the most despicable things to each other, when scientists held to no oath and instead created chemicals and creatures that were designed to maim their enemies as much as possible, what constituted harm? Was it worse to kill this man now, as he asked, or to force him to endure pain and suffering when he would almost certainly die?

When Helen didn’t answer quickly enough, the soldier repeated his plea: “ _Please_.”

Helen kept a knife in her boot. She would not shoot this man, would not perform an execution. If she was going to do this, she would do it with her hands, so she would never forget the weight of it.

“All right,” she whispered, tugging the blade from her sock. She rolled the man back onto his side again, shifted up behind him. She threaded her fingers through his hair, turned his face slightly toward her.

“Do you want me to...pray for you?” she asked, feeling foolish, but knowing that some people’s faith was important to them. Her mother’s had been. Helen had chosen a different path many years ago, but she could still recite something, if he wished her to.

“No,” the soldier whispered, and his tone suggested that if he’d had the strength, he might have laughed. “Don’t think there’s anyone...to hear it.” A pause, then: “ _Thank you_.”

“What’s your name?” she asked, finding it suddenly important. Of course, his identity tags would carry it, so she could report his death to those who would send the information to his loved ones; that wasn’t why she asked. She wanted to know, wanted to carry it with her like she would have to carry this act.

“David,” he breathed. “Matthews.”

“Be at peace, David,” she whispered. “You served bravely.”

Her hand tightened in his hair and she pulled his throat taut. Her hand didn’t tremble as she dragged the knife across it. It was only after, as the young man’s life was bleeding into the dirt, that she began to shake. The knife slid from her fingers and she clutched the soldier’s shoulder, squeezing it tight as sobs wracked her body.

When James found her, less than an hour later, she was no longer crying. She was still kneeling by the corpse of the dead soldier—no, she corrected herself, David Matthews, a man with parents and maybe a wife, a life stolen by this bastard war. She felt numb, found herself staring into the distance, her body heavy. She didn't even look around when she heard footsteps approaching.

"Helen?" James appeared beside her, a stalwart pair of boots and mud-stained trousers. Helen's eyes followed the line of his pant-leg up, past the hem of his coat and up over the bulk of his chest, made thick by the life-preserving machine he kept strapped there. When her eyes reached his, she found them full of compassion and understanding. It was clear that his sharp, observant gaze had taken in the sights around him—the body of the creature, the wound in the soldier's side, the bloody knife fallen beside his body, her own anguish—and he’d read the story of what had gone on here in an instant. She said nothing, just looked at him, and after a moment he moved. Wordlessly he retrieved her gun from where she had dropped it, cleaned her knife on the grass, and tucked both into his belt. He dragged the carcass of the creature into the trees and covered it with leaves. When he returned to her, he offered his hand.

“Come on, Helen,” he said. “We need to get back.”

It was only when he said that that Helen realised how dawn was beginning to creep into the sky; the world was taking on the depth of light and shadow once again. She placed her hand in James’ and let him help her to her feet, and together they made their way back to where the Allied troops were camped.

When they retired shortly after dawn to catch what broken sleep they could, Helen joined James in his tent without so much as a question. They spread their sleeping bags out and crawled underneath them together, and James folded his body around hers and held her close. She shook again, a little, then, but the warmth of him soon calmed her, and she wriggled into his chest and rested her head against his arm. She couldn’t feel his heartbeat, but the whir of the machine vibrated against her back, and it was comforting, knowing how passionately he clung to life, using his mind and his inventiveness to keep the infirmity of old age at bay.

They lay like that for a long time, listening to the sounds of the camp waking up, soldiers moving about and breaking their fast, the tapping of spoons against tin bowls and mugs. Helen didn’t know that she would sleep, but she lay there anyway, needing the contact and the rest whether her mind would quieten or not. Her body had less need of regular sleep than James’ did, but she could feel his wakefulness, too, in the way his thumb stroked back and forth over her forearm. After a time, he shifted slightly, rearranging himself to be more comfortable, moving his body back from Helen’s in the process. She grunted a muffled protest at the loss of his warmth, wriggling back into him, but as she did, she felt a familiar rigidity press into the small of her back, and froze.

James scooted back from her again, making a noise like a thing in pain. “I’m sorry, Helen,” he whispered, loosening his hold on her. “I don’t mean... I didn’t intend... Thoroughly inappropriate.” 

He made to move away from her, but Helen caught his arm, stopping him. “Don’t,” she whispered. “Don’t go, please. It’s...”

She didn’t think, didn’t take a single moment to consider. She half-rolled to face him, slipped her hand around to cup the back of his head, and kissed him. His face was shadowy in the half-light of the tent, but she could see the surprise written on his features in the wake of it.

“James,” she whispered. After that, her hand snaked down between them, slipped over his drawers and wrapped itself around his erection. “ _Please._ ”

His lips pressed against her throat in reply.

They were half-dressed, as was customary when sleeping in a warzone, but they managed to free themselves of the necessary garments with minimal fuss. James’ hand moved between her legs, lifting her thigh to give himself access, and after ensuring that she was ready, he slid himself inside her, curling his hand around her hip as she arched into him.

It was quiet and urgent, full of things unspoken, but what could feel more natural after a night of  
such horrible death than this reaffirmation of life?

*

It is not a one-time thing. Nigel rejoins their camp shortly after that night, and then they are herded back by the Nazis, trapped at Dunkirk beach, and they know they are closer to losing the war than they've ever been. Helen is sure Nigel notices that she and James no longer sleep in separate tents, but he accepts it and says nothing.

Not so with Nikola, when the evacuation by sea is successful and they return to London. He sees the new way James' eyes linger on her, the way she takes an extra moment to remove her hand from his arm, and his eyes twinkle with understanding.

"It won't last," he murmurs to her one day, when they are both focused on deciphering a code sent to them by a spy. "He's going to die, and you're not. That always gets in the way, eventually. At least, it does when they love you."

"I'll thank you to keep out of it," Helen replies, with some asperity, but she can't help but wonder if he's right.

James looks at her with awe, devotion, like he can't believe this is happening, and it makes her heart catch to see it, but she can't help but wonder if what they have is healthy. They cling to each other as they hunker underground while bombs fall over London, passing the time by covering themselves with blankets and letting their fingers roam, teasing silently in crowded shelters. Helen moves above him on a frozen Moscow night after they both almost lose their lives to a creature, her skin pebbling in the improperly heated room. The moon comes in through the frost-covered windows and paints her skin with icicle patterns, but the warmth between them is enough to keep them whole. Afterward, James pulls the duvet up over their heads and lets his fingers trace over her body while she listens to the familiar whine his machine makes when he has exerted himself too much.

"You make me feel alive," he whispers to her in the dark, and she wonders if that's all it is, really. She needs him to reaffirm her humanity in the face of the evil she sees everywhere, and he needs her because she's so perfectly hale and whole, and without her he would see himself in the faces of all those dead men.

It continues. How can it not, when they have been friends, loved each other, for sixty years? What will happen to that, if it ends? He tells her he loves her, she calls him 'darling,' and for a while, it's enough.

Then the war ends.

Helen returns to London with James, and together they run the growing Sanctuary network from there. It feels like being married, living in this place she built with her father, having breakfast together and sharing an office, and Helen finds that idea strangely unwelcome. It's strange because it's what she once wanted, to share her life with someone, but now she finds herself missing Old City and her independence.

It's not just that, though. Her relationship with James is...lacking. The fire that kept them warm during the war is no longer bright. Without the gunfire and grenades, there's nothing to fuel it. Sex that was once reassuring is now routine. James is a thoughtful and generous lover, but he's only capable of a few positions, with the machine that he relies on, and even then, he has to recalibrate it after each exertion—it was never the same, after Normandy. He still whispers to her afterward, telling her how much she means to him, how she gives him life, but it's no longer the endearment it once was. Instead, it has the air of a plea, desperate and needy, and Helen feels trapped by it and guilty for thinking that at once. She needed him during the war, and he was there for her, solid and steadfast as he always has been. Her need has gone, faded in the wake of the armistice, but how can she leave him when he still needs her so desperately? She stays, trying to make it enough, but eventually, her sense of entrapment finds a way to rise to the surface, quite against her will.

In September of 1946, restoration on one of the most heavily bomb-damaged wings of the National Gallery is complete, and Helen and James are invited to a gala held in honour of its reopening. Helen revels in the opportunity, embracing the emerging postwar fashion trends by dressing in red, a frock with an asymmetrical, cinching black waistband, with a half-girdle, nylon stockings, and a fantastic pair of heels. She feels like a woman again, vital and powerful as she moves through the crowd, fully sexed in her figure-hugging gown, and dangerous because everyone here served in some way, but she is one of the few women to have been designated Special Forces.

When she is helping herself to a snack at the function’s refreshment table—it’s frugal by the standards of the past, rationing still being in place, but there are dishes here that she hasn’t seen in five years—a rather dashing young man approaches her and introduces himself. He is blond, American, and barely out of his twenties, and Helen finds herself responding to him with far more warmth than she ordinarily might have. Here is a man capable of handling everything she is tonight, stylish in his postwar suit and powerful beneath it, all lithe muscle and confidence. They take a walk around the room and Helen laughs and flirts, all the while aware of James brooding in a corner, watching.

He is quiet, later, after they return home. He unfastens his out-of-style cravat and drapes it over a chair. Helen removes her jewellery with the aid of the mirror, and James appears behind her shoulder as she’s setting her earrings atop the dresser. “What?” she asks, reaching up to unclasp her necklace. Her voice comes out cooler, sharper than she intended, and she sees the flinch in his eyes. His hand appears above her shoulder, and he hesitates for a moment before he lays it there, against the curve of her neck.

“You looked lovely tonight,” he tells her. “Every inch the postwar beauty.” His thumb slides over the back of her neck. “Just like that young hero you were talking to. Someone told me he’s to be awarded the Medal of Honor when he returns to the United States.”

“Is he?” Helen asks, letting her necklace slip over her fingers and fall into a coil beside the earrings.

“Mm,” James murmurs. “He didn’t tell you that?”

“It never came up.”

Helen doesn’t know what she was expecting, what she wanted to happen in this moment. Part of her, she supposes, wanted to provoke James, make him jealous. Rekindle some of the passion they used to have. She doesn’t doubt that she succeeded in part. James can be jealous, just like anyone, but he’s not possessive. He is never going to get angry or shout, give her the chance to rail at him. Instead, he looks at her with eyes that are full of too much understanding and no small amount of hurt, and she feels like a child. She wants to erase this evening, make everything better.

Helen turns to face him, pulls him close, and kisses him. “ _James,_ ” she whispers, voice like an ache.

“ _Helen,_ ” he replies, just as gravely.

Words are heavy and cumbersome, though, so they say no more. Instead, they let their bodies speak. His hand slides around to unzip her dress—and how many times has he marvelled at the elegant simplicity of that invention in the act of disrobing her—as she tugs at the buttons of his shirt. They manoeuvre in an awkward dance, shedding clothing. James’ jacket lands on the floor, Helen pushes his shirt off his shoulders carefully, mindful of the tubing and straps connecting the machine to his body. Her dress shimmies down over her hips; she leaves it where it lies. James lets Helen unclip garters and remove her girdle, because he claims he can’t keep up with the changes in women’s undergarments. Helen removes her bra as they slide onto the bed.

James pulls her close and kisses her, his hand sliding over the curve of her hip, and Helen feels the routine, the familiarity of it. She feels the warmth of his leg pressed against hers, and the machine is warm too, though in a different way, when her hand brushes it as she reaches up to cup James' shoulder, slide her fingers down his arm. When did it become commonplace for her to go to bed with a man with portable life-support strapped to his chest? It should be wondrous, a miracle, but Helen just feels the distance it puts between them. She has never felt his heart beating in time with hers.

James pushes her hair away from her shoulder and she feels his lips upon her neck as his hand slides up to cup her breast, and _no,_ she thinks, she will not have those thoughts here, not now. Forcing her mind silent, she cants her head to give him better access, arches her back, and gives herself away to feeling.

His kisses move down over her shoulder to her chest. She feels the barest hint of stubble on his cheek as it brushes her skin. His mouth closes around her nipple, and she groans, slipping her hand into his hair and raking her nails over his scalp. He hums with approval and she feels it move through her, a vibrating warmth. His fingers trail over her stomach—they're softer than they were during the war, when they'd been rough with calluses from holding a gun—and slip beneath the waistband of her knickers, sliding down to cup her sex, his middle finger seeking out her wet warmth. It works back and forth, spreading her slickness, then slips inside her and crooks upward. Helen moans again, hips arching, and snakes her own hand down between them and into his drawers, wrapping it around his cock and stroking him in time with the thrusts of his finger.

"Come up here," he murmurs, when he feels her beginning to writhe, needing more. He slides his hand out from between her thighs, touches her hip, and she releases her hold on him as he lets himself fall onto his back.

Helen knows what he wants. She sits up, shimmying out of her knickers, and climbs over him. He welcomes her with his hands, settling one on her hip and cupping the other around her rump, directing her as she shuffles up until her sex hovers over his face. He tugs her down, and she threads one hand through his hair and presses the other against the wall as his tongue swipes over her.

This is heaven. _This_ she could take all day. Helen works her hips, sliding back and forth as he works his mouth over her, lifting and sinking to allow him breath, throwing her head back and letting heavy, animal noises rumble up from her throat. She rights herself again, tugging on his hair as she drops her eyes to look at him, all concentration and hunger. He hums against her, looks up at her face, and she smiles, purring her approval and letting go of the wall to cup her own breast, working her hips all the while. He is remarkably good at this.

He doesn't let up. His tongue slides inside her, lips curling up to suckle at her clitoris. He covers her with his mouth. Her head falls back again, her eyes close, and there is nothing but him, the silky feeling of his tongue in her coupled with the roughness of his cheeks against her thighs, and then she is clenching his hair tight in her fist and hissing his name as she comes.

She slides off him, then, all but falls onto the bed beside him, but pushes herself up to sit, leaning on one hand and curling her legs back, watching him work his drawers off as she catches her breath. When he settles again beside her, she reaches up and licks her palm, then wraps her hand around him again, stroking slowly, spreading the damp from her hand and that which has leaked from him. She squeezes him gently, watching his face and crooking an eyebrow in question. Does he want her to reciprocate?

He grunts a no. “Want to be inside you,” he breathes. “Want all of you.”

All of her. His words bring back the feeling of entrapment, the sense of power she felt earlier that night. He's never had even _close_ to all of her. She's capable of so much more than the slow and gentle, the quietly familiar, and suddenly she can't bear the thought of having that sort of sex tonight. She wants to be taken, claimed. She wants him above her, pinning her down, his broad shoulders caging her beneath them. She leans down to kiss him, long and hard.

“Then have me, James. Throw me onto my back and fuck me. _Please_.”

She sees the hesitation in his eyes, the surprise. It isn’t good for him, to be in that position. Puts too much strain on the straps and tubes, but her plea rattles him, and her use of the word _fuck_ convinces him of her need. It’s a word she rarely uses—she does still have _some_ of her Victorian sensibilities, after all. Determination fills his eyes; he always wants so badly to please her.

There isn’t much throwing, but he does move down the bed, then reaches for her, tugging on her ankles, then gripping her behind the knees and pulling her toward him. She slides, falls back against the sheets, feeling her hair spread out above her and grinning.

“ _Yes,_ ” she breathes, as he pulls her legs apart, wrapping them around his waist and pulling her hips up to meet him. He thrusts into her, wasting no time, then he is lowering himself over her and pinning her beneath him just like she’d hoped he would. Helen arches beneath him, wraps her legs around him and urges him on. His eyes are full of fire, he growls and wrenches her leg higher, pushing deeper. One of her hands fists in the sheets and the other wraps itself around the headboard. 

“ _Harder,_ ” she hisses, hips rising to meet his, and he obliges, increasing the force of his thrusts, pounding her into the mattress.

Helen’s head arches back against the sheets and her eyes close. Her mouth is open wide and every breath comes out as a strangled sound. The air is full of sounds, James’ grunts and the slap of skin against skin. She feels herself getting close again, pulls James even closer with her free leg, heel against his backside, and they are one creature made of heat and sweat and wet friction.

James cries out, and for a moment Helen thinks it’s in passion, but then he is pulling away from her and her eyes fly open. He is reeling, scrambling backward off the bed. One of the tubes has torn out of his side and is squirting yellowish fluid; the hole where it was is bleeding.

“James!” Helen gasps, but he waves her back as he rolls off the bed, stumbling across the room to where he keeps the equipment he uses to service the machine. Helen, reeling and disoriented, still breathless, doesn’t move. She simply watches as he fumbles the case open, grabs a tool and a swatch of sterile cloth. His back is turned to her so she can’t see what happens, but she hears his hiss of pain as he reconnects the tubing, then he lurches over to the window and grips its sill, and she hears the click of the dials turning as he recalibrates the machine.

Helen thinks to go to him. She twists, swinging her legs, half-tangled in sheets, over the edge of the bed, but she sees James’ neck and shoulders stiffen at the sound of her movement, and freezes where she is.

He makes the last adjustment but stays still, staring out at the London night and recovering his breath. Helen feels her own equilibrium returning, the heat of her almost-climax fading from her body and clearing her mind, and when it goes it leaves behind a heavy weight, a sick feeling in her stomach. A knot of guilt.

James stares out the window for a long time. Helen doesn't move, watching him. When he speaks, eventually, his voice is far away.

"Arthur Conan Doyle didn't write me as the sidekick because I insisted on it, you know. He wrote me that way because that is what I am. The mad genius needed to be detached, separated from his humanity, lest all the things he saw weigh him down with the feeling of them. He would live in an age of advancement and understand the value of each and every new invention and idea, but he would also see the potential harm, the human cost, and he would shy away from as much as he embraced. He would observe the wisdom of age, and want to acquire it, but he would also see the weakness and fragility of the human body, and be terrified of growing old. He would care deeply about love, instead of scorning it, but he would see in his lover's eyes when it had gone, or when it wasn't enough. And that man, he wouldn't be much of a hero."

_James,_ Helen wants to say, but finds she has no words. Her breath leaks out of her silently.

He continues. “I can’t do this anymore, Helen. Can’t keep up with you. I’m an old man, despite my best efforts, and you’re...” His hand makes a fist against the windowsill, his voice grates out of him. “You belong in this time, somehow, like you’ve belonged in every other one. I can’t-” He shakes his head, defeated.

Helen isn’t sure what she expected this moment to be like. A relief, perhaps? Did she think that the end would be liberating, after so many months of trying but failing? It isn't. There is nothing cathartic about this.

“James, it's not-” she whispers, and that finally makes him turn, but it’s not gentle. It’s the anger she thought to see before, that she’d hoped to bait him into that evening.

“Don’t tell me that it isn’t me, Helen. I see too much, remember? You’ve been drifting way for months now. Did you think I wouldn’t notice?” His eyes soften a moment later, anger replaced with the desperate sadness that she suspects must fill her own. “I know you don’t want it to be me, any more than I do, but please don’t try and lie to me.”

Helen says nothing for a moment. Her hands grip the edge of the mattress hard. "You knew?" she asks quietly, after a breath. "And yet you kept telling me how much you needed me, giving me all you had, trying to keep me here?"

James lets out a heavy sigh, glances at the floor. "I suppose I thought- But that isn't fair. Keeping you here isn't going to keep me young, it's just going to drain all the life out of you."

Silence follows. It stretches, heavy and final, between them. Helen lets out a sigh of her own. “I’m sorry, James. I wish...”

“So do I,” he replies heavily, and turns away from her again.

Helen sits there for a moment longer, silent and still; then: “I- We’re still friends, aren’t we?” She hates the way it comes out. She sounds like a lost little girl, like she had when she was six and had owned a pet rabbit that had one night escaped from its hutch and been half-devoured by a fox. She remembers finding it in the morning, picking up the ravaged remains, taking them to her father and asking him to fix Ginger, because he was a doctor. It’s the same tone in her voice now, desperate for hope.

James looks back at her, and his eyes are like her father’s were that day, full of a tired, sad honesty. “Of course we are, Helen. We’ve known each other a lifetime.”

She believes him, but she also knows that it will never be quite the same.

~*~


	4. Chapter 4

**1954**

Sex, Helen Magnus thinks, when given freely and honestly as simply that, can be a gift between friends.

She thinks this as Bigfoot flees down the hall away from her, stiff-legged and panting grunts. He's in his mating cycle. He hasn't told Helen this, but it's obvious to her. Every five years, Sasquatches enter a week long period of heightened senses, agitation and arousal, and are hit with an almost irresistible desire to mate. This is Bigfoot's first such cycle since his arrival at the Sanctuary, and although he is kind, generous and naturally inclined toward trust, he has been cautious about forming relationships since his arrival here three years ago, and consequently there is no one he knows well enough to make an intimate request of. Indeed, Helen is the only one here with whom he has formed any sort of friendship, and although they trust each other, having discussed both the lighter and the heavier things—she knows, for example, that part of the reason he has been so slow to connect with others here is because he was hurt badly by the last group of Abnormals whose acquaintance he made, so badly, in fact, that he ended up with several bullets in him at the end of it—there has always been a respectful distance between them befitting staff and employer.

Hence the running away. Helen knows the past two days have been difficult for Bigfoot, but it was only this morning that she realised why his reaction to her specifically has been so marked. She realised at the moment she woke up that morning, rolling onto her chest to silence her alarm clock and feeling her breasts protest, tender and full.

Helen's physiology is not like other womens'. Because of her incredibly slow aging process, her ovaries only release an egg approximately every eight years, so she has roughly a fortnight of fertility per decade. It isn't usually a very pleasant time for the people around her - unlike normal human women, who experience those hormonal fluctuations every month, and are thus somewhat aware of and able to control their responses to them, Helen is often blindsided by irrational emotion long before she realises its cause. That is not the problem this time, however. This time the problem is that Bigfoot can smell it—her sweat laced with pheromones—and it's making an already uncomfortable time for him well nigh unbearable.

Helen retreats into her office—which he wouldn't even cross the threshold of, she had to come out into the hallway to speak with him—and paces the room, thinking. This week is not likely to get any easier for Bigfoot: his need will only grow, and her hormone level will continue to increase until it peaks a few days before her period. Their interactions will be torture for him. She has no desire to put him through that, but she also doesn't want to send him away. Any action like that, even if Helen could think of a legitimate reason for it, would imply that he was incapable of making his own decisions, or controlling his desires, and Helen always tries to avoid the trap of thinking that humans know better. Experience has proved otherwise to her many, many times.

Other than distance, though, there is only one solution. Scratching the itch, so to speak. Putting him out of his misery.

The idea is far from repellant to Helen. Her friendship with Bigfoot is based on mutual respect and trust. She likes him, quite a bit, and his physical appearance, while quite different to any other lover she has taken, is not displeasing to her. She does not find him attractive, precisely—he is not, by human standards—nor does she think that any difference makes him exciting or exotic, which is a line of thought that she would find hugely problematic, if she felt it. No, her interest is purely in easing his discomfort, and hopefully having a pleasurable experience of her own, of course. Helen doesn't think there is anything wrong with wanting that. She wouldn't like to think of it as charity, either, because that would be equally as condescending as sending him on a convenient mission for a week.

And so she is satisfied that her motivations are legitimate, but that is not the only concern. Helen has made the mistake of complicating friendship with sex before, with disastrous results. Her friendship with James has recovered somewhat in the years since their sexual relationship ended, but it remains awkward, tense at times, and Helen suspects it has been irrevocably altered. Is such a result inevitable, when one introduces sex to a friendship, or was it that she and James conflated sex with a type of romantic love, failing to acknowledge that that was not the kind of love that existed between them? Helen thinks of some of her other sexual experiences—with WaveSong, for example—that resulted in improved communication and understanding of each other, instead of the breakdown of it, and she thinks that it is indeed possible to have sex with a friend and not alter the friendship, but only if both parties involved are honest with each other about their needs and expectations.

Helen nods to herself, mind made up, and ten minutes later she finds herself downstairs, knocking on Bigfoot's door. Although he hasn't made friends of them, Bigfoot seems to be more comfortable living amongst the Abnormal population. Helen offered him rooms upstairs when she took him on as a member of staff, but he declined, saying he preferred his lab-level den. Helen thought it unfortunate that the Sanctuary seemed to have divided into human and Abnormal quarters (although she is, herself, technically Abnormal), but she respected his decision and his need for space. She has never been inside his room before.

He opens the door in a matter of moments, but when he sees her he freezes. His eyes widen and his broad nostrils flare, but he doesn't grunt as much as before, and Helen smells the distinctive aroma of what the staff jokingly refer to as his 'special herbs,' a blend of marijuana and other medicinal plants that grow in his native habitat. Clearly, his conversation with her affected him greatly, and although she regrets disturbing his calming ritual, the evidence of it only reaffirms her decision to offer herself to him.

"O!chndar," she pronounces it badly, but uses the name he once told her when she insisted upon knowing it, because Helen believes that using people's proper names is a mark of respect, even if, in his case, it did prove too difficult. "May I come in?"

He hesitates, grunting and searching for a response, so Helen adds: "I understand what is happening, and I trust you completely. If you're not interested in what I'd like to suggest, I'll leave immediately."

He regards her with eyes that are wary but curious, then moves away from the door, gesturing her inside. She enters, and he immediately crosses the room, shoulders tense. He flinches when she closes the door behind her, sealing her smell in there with him, but he reaches for the pipe smouldering on the side-table next to his armchair, and after taking one final puff, empties the bowl into his ashtray and smothers the ashes with a finger.

Helen remains by the closed door, knowing he needs the distance. After a moment, he turns.

"What did you want to speak to me about?" he asks, voice tight but controlled.

Helen hesitates for a moment, wondering what to say, how to broach the subject, but she hasn't lived for 104 years without learning how to navigate awkwardness. She speaks.

"I know things have been difficult for you these past few days, and that I'm...not helping. But I wanted to come down here and say that there's no need for you to avoid me. I am more than willing to help you relieve the tension. That is, we're friends. I like you and I trust you, and I think we could have an enjoyable experience together. I think we know each other well enough, respect each other enough, that it wouldn't come between us later and make things strange, as long as we're honest with each other. I'm not in love with you; I don't want to start an affair, but you need, and I'd like. A gift between friends, if you will. If you feel the same way about me and what our relationship is."

It's not the smoothest or most charming speech that Helen has ever made, but it's honest, and she thinks that's more important. "If you're not interested," she adds, "you need only say no, and I'll leave. No explanation required." She smiles tentatively and waits for him to respond.

It takes him some time. He watches her silently, his large hand resting against the back of his armchair, but she can tell that his eyes are on her more by chance than design. He is looking at her, but his thoughts are focused on something other than her physical form. Thinking over what she said. After a time, he responds.

"I think... I feel the same way about our friendship. Trust and respect. I don't think it would become...complicated. I don't find you unattractive, though you do have less hair than I'm used to."

Helen smiles, gestures at the door. "If you like, I could come back in a few days. I can have some more by then."

Bigfoot laughs, and Helen likes the deep-belly sound of it. "Not necessary," he says, then his mood turns serious again. "I have never been with a human woman before, though. Other Abnormals, since I left my people, but never a human. I can get...carried away. Forceful."

The thought gives Helen a tiny thrill, but she is aware that that is not his intention. 'Forceful' by his reckoning might be quite a bit more intense than it is by human standards.

"Can you take instruction?" Helen asks. "Slow down if I need you to?"

"Yes," he answers.

"Then I think we'll be fine. I don't mind a bit of rough."

He smiles, and she sees the first traces of heat in his eyes.

"One more thing. You are fertile. Our species are close enough that you may conceive. I'm not sure that I want to become a father."

"I have protection," Helen says, patting her pocket.

"Then...yes. Please." He laughs, and so does Helen, but there is a nervous quality to it. Where to now?

Helen hesitates for a moment, dances on one foot, but then she moves forward, and so does he. They meet in the middle of the room and his arms wrap around her. He pulls her hard against him and crushes his lips against hers. His body is solid, hard like a tree, and the kiss is hungry, but not terribly satisfying, so Helen reaches up and fists her hand in his hair, giving it a tug to pull him back a little. He backs off, surprised, and then Helen moves in again, going slower this time, feeling out his mouth, tasting the remnants of weed and herb on his tongue. When she pulls away, he grunts and smiles.

"You're good at that."

"Years of practice," she replies in a breath.

He sheds her clothes. Works her jacket down over her shoulders and off. His large hands are remarkably dexterous, unbuttoning her blouse with ease and sending it the same way as the jacket.

"If you knew," he rumbles, "what you smell like to me." His voice turns to grunts, and it takes him a moment to recover human language. "Like spring, but not flowers. Not green. Before that, the beginning, when everything is just coming to life." His lips come down against her throat, his tongue slides up to the base of her ear. When he speaks again his voice is right there, breathing into it. "Like earth, churned and wet." His voice gives way to grunts again. Helen can't quite imagine what all that smells like, but its effect on him now that he isn't fleeing from it is abundantly clear.

The skirt goes next, unzipped and pushed down over her hips in an instant, leaving Helen in her bra and knickers while he remains fully clothed. She wants to see him, stops him before he can undress her any further and instead helps him off with his own clothes, working the t-shirt up over his belly before he has to take over, tugging it up over his head, out of her reach. She looks at him when it's off, takes the time to run her hands over his chest. His skin is brown like tree bark, and he's no hairier there than some human men. His powerful pectorals are clearly defined, and though he carries some weight around his middle, she can still feel the strength there when her hand passes over his abdomen. His shoulders are where the hair is, and his back is thickly furred. She slips a hand up to twist a dark nipple, and his grunt in response is almost a growl.

"More hair than I'm used to," she says, smiling, echoing his earlier words, "but you'll do. Now, do your worst, and I'll tell you if it's too much."

He smiles, the expression almost predatory, and the next moment, Helen is being lifted off the ground and they are crashing against the wall, her back coming up hard against it and his hands covering her. He makes short work of the bra, and then his large palms are cupping her breasts, covering the entire swell of them, kneading and grazing thumbs over her nipples. His hands are rough and callused.

"Smooth," he grunts, sliding his hand down over her stomach and back up again. "You are very smooth. Feels good. Fragile, though. Feel like I might break you."

"I'm stronger than I look," Helen whispers. She reaches down, pushes at the waistband of his trousers, but he stops her.

"Not yet," he says. "If you touch me I will...lose control. I am big. Need to make sure that you are...well prepared."

He doesn't say it boastfully, just matter-of-fact. Doesn't care if she's impressed or not. Helen finds she likes that, his confidence and his care. She arches off the wall when he works her knickers down, helping him get them off her. His nails present a problem—they are long, thick and ragged—but he curls his thumb under and slips his hand between her thighs, knuckles up. Helen groans when the back of his hand presses into her sex, a low rumble that curls out of her throat. She presses back against him, pushing her shoulders into the wall, and grinds on him, moaning encouragement.

"Humans make interesting noises," he remarks, almost casual, kneading her breast with his free hand and twisting her nipple. "Change colour, too." Helen looks down at herself, flushed pink with need, and laughs, though the sound comes out rather breathless.

"Just means," her voice catches on a sigh, "that you're," she whimpers, "doing it right." Her thigh jerks when his knuckle finds her clitoris, pressing and circling. "Bloody hell," she breathes, "thought I was...here...to do this for you."

"You will," he promises, voice more menacing than she's ever heard it before. The sound of it, grating and rough, sends a thrill through Helen that only adds to the heat building in her. "Need this, though. To take me." His hand grinds, fingers twist, and Helen bucks against him. She's almost there.

"Enough," she breathes, though it's excruciating to say. Her body craves release, but if she finishes now, she'll be too sensitive to take him as hard as she'd like. "I'm ready."

Bigfoot stops. His hand slides slowly out from between her thighs, smearing her wetness as it goes, then he lifts it to his face and inhales deeply.

"Yes," he agrees raggedly, after a series of uncontrollable grunts. "I think you are."

The sight of him like that, completely overcome by the smell of her, fills Helen with a sense of incredible urgency. "Rubber," she breathes, "pocket of my jacket. Now."

He complies, moving away from her and loosening his trousers, shedding them over his hips. Helen, sagging against the wall, catches a glimpse of him as he bends to retrieve her jacket, fishing the small foil wrapper from the pocket. He _is_ big. Thick as though hewn from a log, and Helen finds herself grateful for his careful preparation as she watches him tear open the wrapper and roll the rubber down over his length.

"Should we move...bed?" Helen asks, as Bigfoot rights himself again and faces her.

"Beds," he declares, moving toward her, "are for sleeping."

When he reaches her, he takes her by the hips and lifts her clear off the ground. She gasps, throwing her arms around his neck instinctively. The sudden lift unbalances her, and she feels heady as he pins her to the wall, then releases her for a moment before catching her by the back of her thighs and hitching her legs up around around his waist. He pulls her toward him, down, and his cock fills her, stretching her wide.

He goes slow, at first, letting her adjust to the size of him, but his voice has dissolved completely into grunts now, rough and almost pained, and she knows he's holding back. As soon as she's ready, she urges him on, taking hold of his shoulders and digging her nails into them, tightening her thighs around him and hissing _yes_ , using the leverage to push herself down onto him. He responds hungrily, gripping her thighs like a vice and pushing her harder into the wall, moving faster, going deeper. Helen meets his thrusts with jerks of the hip, tightening herself around him, letting the strength of his movement push the breath out of her in desperate gasps. She revels in it, the strength and power of him, grip never faltering even as he begins to lose control, as his eyes close and he pushes her further, pounding and grunting.

He rasps a word in his own language, it sounds like a ragged curse. "Helen. You. Is this."

"Yes," Helen pants, "yes. Good." She's almost at her limit but she can take this. Struggles for the word to impart this. "Steady. Yes."

"Almost," he breathes, and she can see words are a struggle for him but he's still thinking of her, hasn't lost his mind like he suggested he might.

"Then help," she breathes, letting go of one shoulder and reaching down for his hand. "Help me." Her fingers touch his and he lets go of one thigh, letting her take his hand and guide it between them so his knuckle is against her clitoris again. "There. Yes." 

He presses the knuckle into her, working it back and forth, still pounding into her at full strength, now holding her up with only one arm. She tightens her legs around him, throws her arm around his back, feeling the thick hair there and gripping it tight.

He throws his head back for a moment when she does that, sucking in a garbled breath, then jerks it forward again, bearing down on her, eyes open now, almost black with need. His thumb works her harder, his rhythm falters then resumes, and Helen can feel herself going now, climbing fast under his attention. She pants her approval, tosses her own head back, letting her eyes fall closed and simply feeling: the wall hard against her back, her hair catching on its grain as she arches her neck, his thumb _there_ , right where she needs it, and the almost painful pleasure of his cock moving in and out of her. She's stretched and full, burning up, and she feels her nails digging deeper into his shoulder, fists gripping his back fur tight, and then she's clenching around him, shaking, letting out a strangled cry as she breaks, falls, burns. 

She's dimly aware of his own sound following shortly after, an almost-howl, colossal but far away. She's still arching, spinning somewhere far away from her mind, and she doesn't come back until he's starting to slow, soften. His hands shake but he still holds her fast.

His face presses into her shoulder, he breathes heavily against her skin. Gives one, two, three final thrusts, and then he's done, stilling, settling against her and slipping out of her. She wraps her hand around his neck again, holds him tight, her own chest heaving, out of breath.

They stay there like that for what feels like a long time but must be less than a minute, because his hands are starting to shake badly with the effort of holding her up. His strength is not gone, though. With one final grunt, he tugs her up, pulling her away from the wall and carrying her over to where his bed is nestled against the back wall, a den of blankets half-covered by a curtain. He backs in and pulls her with him, then they are both collapsed on its soft surface, exhausted and recovering their breath.

Helen doesn't move for quite a long time. She lays as she landed when he stretched them out, on her back but with her legs tangled up with each other, one arm by her side and the other flung up by her head. Bigfoot's arm is draped across her middle, but it's more an exhausted intimacy than a possessive one. When her body starts to cool, she shifts, stretches, enjoying the ache that is already settling into her muscles and between her thighs—the best sort of soreness—and grabs the corner of a blanket that hangs down off the bed, under her back, pulling it around her shoulders as she rolls slightly to face him.

"That was rather enjoyable," she says, smiling at him and propping her head up on her hand.

"Do you feel... relieved, now?"

Bigfoot grunts a laugh. His eyes are blue again, soft and satisfied. "Very," he says. "Thank you."

"My pleasure," Helen replies, then laughs at herself. She lets it fade, enjoying how warm and easy it is between them, then allows herself a moment of seriousness. "You were attentive and thoughtful, generous. I hope you don't ever think yourself animalistic, because that is far from the truth. There are plenty of human men I've known who had far less interest in learning my body than you took, and they had much less difference to navigate."

He blinks. "They are fools, then. Enjoyment of the other increases enjoyment of the self. Should know that."

Helen smiles. "You seemed to like it when I pulled your fur. Does that feel good for you?"

He grunts. "Yes. Thinner skin there, lots of nerves. Grooming fur is a mating ritual."

Helen nods, fascinated. She observes Abnormals scientifically every day, their physical makeup, interactions with their habitats, their feeding habits, and yes, sometimes their mating, but she does not often get to experience their rituals for herself. That's not something science can give her; only friendship allows that opportunity.

"I'll have to remember that," she says. "It could be more useful than the awkward proposition."

Bigfoot chuckles, but shakes his head. "No. Talk was good. Grooming doesn't say where we stand. Besides, you have no back fur."

"True," Helen smiles. "So, you're happy with that? With where we stand? Still?" 

"Yes," Bigfoot says, gaze steady and honest. "And you?"

"Yes," Helen replies.

"Good." He stretches a little, flexing his legs, half-sits and reaches for a blanket, pulls it over them. Helen shifts, rolling onto her back. When they settle, his arm is draped over her again. They are silent for a time, then he murmurs: "I don't know how human men are, after sex, but I am very tired. I hope you will not be upset if I fall asleep."

Helen chuckles, brushes her fingers against him. "Not at all. I think men falling asleep after sex is universal."

"You stay as long as you like," he murmurs. "You are very warm, and you smell even better now than before."

Silence, then. Helen listens as Bigfoot's breathing slows and deepens, eventually giving way to an even snore. She stays a while, enjoying their warmth and the lazy relaxation of her own body, pleased that she did this and certain that it will not adversely affect their friendship. Eventually, though, Bigfoot's snoring grows louder, and enduring that when she doesn't have to is pushing the bonds of friendship just a little too far.

He stirs when she does, blinking and murmuring groggily. "Going?"

"Mm. You're noisy." She turns, though, and laying her hand on his side, leans down to kiss his cheek. 

"Thank you for a lovely evening."

He smiles, eyes closing again. "My pleasure."

Helen laughs as she slips from the bed.

~*~


	5. Chapter 5

**2012**

Some relationships, Helen Magnus learns, despite all evidence to the contrary, are not about sex at all.

After the explosion, it takes Helen some time to realise that she is indeed alive. It's dark under the rubble and her lungs are full of dust, but Henry's shield vest has done its job, and she is neither burned nor crushed. She's not unscathed, either. Her head is groggy and throbbing—she must have hit it on the floor and fallen unconscious for a time. Her cheek is tight with dried blood and she aches all over, and when she tries to roll onto her side to cough some of the grit from her throat, her right arm all but shrieks with pain and doesn't go with her. She falls back, coughing feebly and gasping at the same time.

When she can, she tries to speak, but the earpiece that is still somehow lodged in her ear remains silent. She supposes she couldn't have expected communication to still be up. Reverting to more primitive methods, she digs into her pocket with her good arm and pulls out the first metallic object her fingers find. She collapses again, exhausted from the exertion, but after a moment she drags herself to the wall of her rubble prison and feels it out until she finds an intact surface, and begins to tap. The sound is painfully quiet, especially with the amount of rubble she must be buried under, but she hopes that her companions' preternatural hearing will be able to detect it. She refuses to even entertain the idea that they have not survived.

It's Nikola who digs her out, minutes or maybe hours later. His eyes are vampire-black as he uses his strength to heave away the heavy stone pillar that forms the roof of her prison, but they fade to blue immediately when he sees her. He looks panicked and urgent, more afraid than she's ever seen him before.

"Helen, thank God," he breathes, climbing down into the rubble to get to her. "We thought- Are you...?"

"I'm all right. Concussion, I think, and- Careful!" she breaks off, hissing as he reaches for her.

He pulls back as though burned, and she hastily adds: "Arm's broken."

He nods, moves more slowly this time, gathering her gently into his arms, and then her head is spinning as he lifts her out of the dark tomb of debris into the openness of night where the lab should have been.

"I've got her," she hears Nikola say, and she turns her head and catches a glimpse of Henry, face pasty white as it reverts from wolf to man, his eyes full of the same panic and relief that Nikola's had held. She smiles at him, weakly, before the spinning becomes too much and everything blurs and goes black.

She wakes, she's told, three days later, in the known but as yet unfamiliar warmth of her bed in the new Sanctuary. It seems Nikola was able to find it from the brief glimpse he got of the schematics before the explosion. She sits up, and her body is sore but healing. Her broken arm is plastered and heavy by her side. She makes a noise, and the sound has barely left her lips before Nikola is there in the doorway.

"Will," she says, full of sudden panic, "Kate. They think I'm..."

Nikola cuts her off. "Henry sent them an encrypted message, once he deciphered your new system. Told them we were alive, and that we'd be in contact."

"Where is...?"

"Safely arrived in London, no doubt busy picking out authentic furs for his little one's den, or whatever it is you do when you're expecting a small furry thing." Nikola smiles, then adds: "He wanted to wait 'til you were up, but your instructions on the new system were very clear. Your death is confirmed, and I'm sure he made the pilgrimage to London looking appropriately sad. He was remarkably hurt that you set up new computers without him."

Helen slumps back against pillows, panic fading to weariness with the knowledge that her instructions had been followed and that everyone who needed to know she was alive did.

"It was necessary," she answers Nikola's unspoken question, eyes closing for a moment.

"Really," Nikola replies, and the faint trace of reproach in his usual sardonic tone makes her look at him again. "Micromanaging everything from what could have actually been the grave was _necessary_? There was _no one_ you could have trusted with the information ahead of time? It's nice to know how much faith you have in us, Helen."

Helen sighs. She's tired, but she supposes she's glad he isn't offering her any sympathy, going easy on her because of her injuries. She certainly knows she doesn't deserve it. She'd known these feelings would arise when she decided to keep her plans secret; she can't expect parley now just because she's bruised.

"I'm sorry, Nikola," she says. "I do trust you, all of you. I just... It was only me for so long, 113 years. It felt so fragile, and it was so vital... I was afraid of losing control of it, and I didn't even know where to begin, to tell anyone. Like it would all go up in smoke if I let go of it."

It's not much of an explanation, she knows, but it's all she can manage right now, and Nikola seems to know that. Understands her better than anyone left alive, and she sees the hurt fade to acceptance in his eyes.

"I suppose you wouldn't be you," he says, "if you weren't completely impossible, even out-cold."

Helen smiles, the expression tired, and reaches for him. He approaches the bed cautiously, as though afraid she might pull a gun on him like she had in the past, then slips his hand into hers and just stands there, half comfortable and half awkward.

"You need to rest," he says quietly, after a time.

"I know," Helen replies, but she has one more concern first. "The Abnormals?"

"They're all fine. The group from the Homeland retreated into the Hollow Earth tunnels, and I'm sure Kate will bring them here as soon as you send word. I've been...feeding...the others. You need to hire someone for that, because it's disgusting, and I'm a genius. I don't do manual labour, and I am _not_ taking that job now that Henry and the big..." He stops himself when Helen winces, filled suddenly with a hollow, aching grief, and no small amount of guilt. There had been many costs she had been willing to pay to bring her plans to fruition, but the loss of her old friend was not one of them, and it's a heavy weight she'll have to carry.

"What happened to him?" Helen asks, and Nikola squeezes her hand.

"Henry found him, after I found you, and we buried him by the river, as close to the grounds as we could manage, once the fire department was gone."

"As he wanted," Helen whispers.

"No more," Nikola says. "You need to rest now. Everything can wait. _I_ won't burn the place down."

He slips away shortly after, though Helen suspects he has not gone far, and after a while she closes her eyes again and allows herself sleep.

*

They recover, in the days that follow. Helen sends word to Kate, who begins to move the willing Abnormals from Hollow Earth to the new Sanctuary, and they trickle in while Helen stays in bed and oversees none of it. It's what she wants, for this place to be self-governed, and even if she didn't, she's not sure Nikola would let her out. He's with her constantly, bringing her meals, checking if she's thirsty, making sure that she sleeps instead of spending her nights on her computer, tinkering with the new system or typing reports left-handed. Helen might call it doting, except that he punctuates everything with his particular brand of sarcastic charm and flirtation. “I like you helpless,” he says in the morning, when he brings her English breakfasts, then has to cut her sausage for her. When he catches her typing at midnight, he tells her that there are many more entertaining things they could be doing, if she's really that restless. Helen arches a brow at him and flirts back, matching him quip for quip as she has for so many years, but it feels warmer now, somehow. Something changed when she kissed him that night, when their fear revealed just how much they cared about each other. Helen doesn't know precisely _what_ is different, but she's open to the idea of discovery.

She begins to heal. Within days, the bruises and scrapes start to fade, the general ache lessens. Helen leaves her bed and walks around her room. She stands by the window, which affords her a spectacular view of the new place, and watches as it comes to life. She feels peaceful, detached in a way that feels right, seems healthy. She is the provider but not the ruler. She thinks of Will, and how badly she wants him to see this, but the time isn't quite right yet. The last she heard, he was still working for SCIU, and she wants to give him time to decide what he wants. If he does join her here, she wants him to see the place thriving, alive, and she wants to be her proper self when she introduces him to it.

She wants to give herself time to feel out this change in her relationship with Nikola.

Her broken arm bothers her. She's not completely helpless, by any means—she manages to eat and wash herself, to work with the aid of her computer—but the restriction frustrates her, makes her feel like she's sitting things out by force, not choice, and she hates that. Nikola comes to her, all abuzz with news of what's happening, how the Abnormals are organizing themselves, creating a society, and after a while she wants to be out in it, not controlling but observing. She wants to learn, but she's vain enough that she wants to look good on her first appearance, or maybe humble enough that she doesn't want the Abnormals to see her as some battered saviour. She doesn't want to be conspicuous, she wants to blend in.

She wants her bloody arm to heal, and even more than that, she wants clean hair. It's the one thing she can't manage, with the cast. She can wrap her arm in plastic and shower, can soap herself down with her left hand, can let her hair get wet and can even brush it when she gets out, but the one thing she can't manage is washing it, and it's ridiculous because she just blew up a building and saved the world, _again_ , but now she doesn't feel like herself because she can't get the shampoo out of the bottle.

She puts up with it for two weeks before she finally caves. It's morning and she's having breakfast with Nikola. She's wrapped in a robe—embroidered silk, her favourite—which she managed to tie closed with her awkward left fingers and the weight of the cast pinning the sash against her, and he's dressed for the day when he brings her her meal. He obviously thinks she needs something sweet because it's not English breakfast today, but berry and mascarpone crepes, along with her usual pot of Earl Grey.

"I like that you have a cook now," he says, setting the tray down on the table by the window.

"Who knew that Septerran would be such a capable chef?"

"Why shouldn't she be?" Helen asks, setting her laptop aside before sliding out of bed to join him. "Her diet and taste receptors are virtually identical to ours. Well, mine, anyway." She slips into the chair opposite the one he's standing beside, watching as he pours two cups of tea and fixes hers the way she likes it.

"Oh, no reason," he says, smiling. "I'm merely impressed by her creativity. I told her I was tired of cutting up greasy sausages for you, and she came up with this in minutes."

"It does look delicious," Helen agrees, surveying the meal, "but you'll still have to cut it up."

"Oh, I don't mind that," he says, sitting once their tea is served and pulling the plate toward him. "It was the boring Englishness that I was starting to get tired of." He's trying to bait her; it's obvious in the tiny twitch at the corner of his mouth, but Helen doesn't rise to it. Truth be told, she's not much of a 'full English' sort of person; she's only been eating them so often lately because the protein is good for her healing, and they all have more important things to do at present than source and buy her quinoa.

"She's full of information, too," he continues smoothly, when he doesn't get the rise out of her that he'd hoped to. His hands work quickly with fork and knife, slicing the crepes into bite-sized pieces. "She lives over in the Eastern block, and she says that a group of them have been in your library, reading about government, and they're talking about trying to set up a democratic council to manage their section." He lays the cutlery down on the plate and turns it toward her, pushing it back across the table.

"Thank you," Helen says, picking up her fork. "That's good to hear. I hope they'll succeed. Heaven knows democracy isn't always easy, but it's certainly what I wished for." She spears a berry with her fork, scoops up a mouthful of the crepe and takes a bite. It's delicious, sweet and tart, and she makes a little noise of pleasure that makes Nikola's eyebrow twitch.

"This is fantastic," she says, after swallowing.

Nikola sits back, lifting his teacup and taking a sip, cradling it in his hands. "If only you'd make those noises for me," he responds in a purr, watching her.

Helen smiles at him, her own eyebrow lifting, and continues to eat. He sips his tea, tells her more of the things he's heard, reaches for a small side-serving of berries that was included on the tray and eats them slowly—a full meal is too much for him, most of the time, but he does enjoy the taste of solid food, Helen knows.

"And how is all this affecting you?" she asks him, when her plate is clean and she has laid her fork aside and picked up her own teacup. "All these creatures who need a leader. Not tempted to try and rule the world again?"

"Please," Nikola scoffs. "World domination is far more effort than it's worth. Too much whining. I like it better in here with you."

In here. She sighs minutely, the sound barely audible, but he hears it.

"What about you?" he asks. "Something tells me this being cooped up is starting to get to you. Content to sit on the sidelines isn't the Helen Magnus I know."

Helen sips her tea. "I do want to let them do it," she says. "I want to let them lead, create a government. I don't want this to be another Praxis. But I do want to see it for myself, feel it. I'm just...waiting, I suppose. When I go out there, I want them to see me, just a woman. Just another one of them, not all battle-scarred from what it took to create this." She lifts her heavy arm, just slightly.

Nikola peers at her. "Helen, have you _met_ these creatures? They're as determined as you are not to have anyone rule over them. If they're not falling to their knees from my charm and charisma, they're certainly not going to think you're the messiah because of a broken arm."

"It's not just..." She trails off. He's right, of course, and she should have thought of that before. Of course the new Sanctuary's inhabitants have conviction and strength of will; how arrogant of her to assume otherwise. She _should_ get out there, let them see her, let them greet her or dismiss her as they will, not sit up here in her tower like some kind of god. 

So what's holding her back? Only vanity, she supposes. She _likes_ to feel good, feel puttogether, not look like an old woman letting herself go. But that's how she feels at the moment, despite the silk robe and the clean pyjamas beneath it. She considers her need, looking at Nikola, weighing the weight of the air between them. She doesn't know what this will do, but...

"Nikola, will you wash my hair?"

He couldn't have looked more shocked if she'd slapped him. He recovers from it quickly, though. Within moments, his open mouth is curling into a smile that shows his canines, and his voice has a musical note in it when he speaks.

"Helen..."

"I feel revolting," she says, noting the light in his eyes but leaving it alone, letting it stay. She doesn't know quite what she wants to come of this, apart from the obvious. "I can't manage it, with this, and it's been a fortnight. If I'm going out there, I want to be..."

"Beautiful?" he finishes for her. "Ravishing as always? I'll have you know, I'd barely even noticed. It doesn't make a difference. But who am I to stand in the way of your little rituals? God knows I'd be depressed if I couldn't button my suit." He waves a hand in the general direction of the bathroom. "Lead the way."

Helen runs a bubble-bath. Despite his words, Nikola doesn't follow her immediately. He stays at the table under the pretext of finishing his tea, and gives Helen time to fill the bath and wrap her arm up against the steam before she settles into the hot water, letting the cast rest against the lip of the bath and leaning back.

She doesn't call out for him, doesn't need to. Almost as soon as she stops splashing, he appears in the doorway, waistcoat gone and shirt-sleeves rolled up, and she gives him a little smile. He's holding the jug from the porcelain washbasin on her dresser, usually a decoration rather than a thing for practical use. It's been hers since 1860, given to her by her mother when she was finally deemed old enough to bathe herself in her room. It survived the trip to the Americas by virtue of being one of the items she'd had sent over later, and is here now because there were some things Helen wasn't willing to part with and smuggled over to the new place under cover of night.

"You don't mind if I use this, do you?" Nikola asks, hefting its weight in his hands. Helen would panic but she knows how quick his reflexes are, knows he is simply baiting her again.

"Not at all," she replies, sounding as unconcerned as she can.

"You look good like that," he says as he enters the room, setting the jug on the vanity and turning on the faucet. "All warm and wet. Rather unsporting of you to use so many bubbles, though." He tests the temperature of the water with a finger, fills the jug, then turns back with a grin.

Helen chuckles, leans her head back against the bath. "You'll just have to do a thorough job, then, won't you? Give them time to vanish."

"Mm," he murmurs, moving around to the back of the bath, behind her head. "You do know how to dangle a carrot, don't you?"

"I've been told it's one of my talents."

He slips his hand down behind her head, lifting it away from the edge of the bath, and urges it back. She complies, letting his palm cup the back of her skull and closing her eyes as he pours the warm water over her hair. He's very good, manages to empty the entire jug with only a single drip running down the side of her face, then refills and repeats the process so her hair is soaked through.

Helen keeps her eyes closed, hears the jug set aside and then the scrape and squirt as he picks up the shampoo bottle and squeezes it. "You know," he says, returning to her, "I've never done this before." His hands against her head again, and the shampoo is slightly cool as he smooths it over her hair, then begins to work it in with the tips of his fingers. "Leave it to you to give a 156-year-old vampire an entirely new experience."

His fingers are gentle but firm, massaging her scalp, working right out to the edge of her hairline then down, past her ears and pressing into the muscles at the back of her neck. He uses all of his fingers at once, presses his thumbs in at the base of her skull, and she can't help but make a little noise and push back against his hands.

"Leave it to you to be so good at it on the first try."

She can hear the smile in his voice when he responds: "Did you ever doubt?" His thumbs press in again, and he makes a thoughtful noise. "You're tighter on the right-hand side. Probably from carrying the extra weight on your arm. Let me..." His slippery fingers work down over her neck, squeezing her shoulder and working into the right-hand side, easing out a knot she hadn't even known was there. She lets out a quiet groan again, shifting ever-so-slightly in the water. She does feel... warm, and not in a way that has anything to do with being submerged in hot water.

"If I'd known you were so vocal," Nikola murmurs, "I might have done this a long time ago." 

Helen smiles and lets her head rest back against his arm. "A long time ago, I might not have let your fingers anywhere near my throat."

Nikola chuckles and his finger brushes over her carotid. "Oh, I can feel you. I never stop being aware. But I barely even remember what blood tastes like." He does let his hand slip away a moment later, however.

Once he's satisfied with the lather in her hair, he refills the jug again. This time, he presses his fingers against her forehead as he pours the water over the top of her head, keeping the suds from trickling down into her eyes. The soapy water rolls down over her shoulders and into the bath, and Helen hears the bubbles begin to sizzle and pop, reacting to it.

Nikola gathers her hair gently and drapes it over the back of the bath. "Shall I condition you now, or would you like me to lather and rinse again?" He asks innocently, oh-so concerned, but Helen hears the subtle thread of insinuation in his voice, and knows that he can see the bubbles beginning to fade.

"Conditioning is fine," Helen says, allowing a little musicality to creep into her own voice.

"Spoilsport," Nikola mutters, though she can hear the smile in his voice.

Helen opens her eyes and she can see the bubbles gradually depleting. She turns her head slightly, watching Nikola from the corner of her eye as he moves back to the vanity and picks up the conditioner.

"Patience," she murmurs, smiling. "A good conditioning treatment takes time, you know."

He turns back toward her with the bottle in his hand. "Well, yours may well be the most thorough ever performed, then." Helen laughs as he moves back over to her, letting her head fall back into his hands when he reaches for her again.

At this point in her life, Helen thinks, closing her eyes again as Nikola smoothes the conditioner over her hair and starts to work it through, she has no real modesty left. Oh, she still believes in propriety—that clothing should suit the occasion it's being worn for, that an outfit that leaves something to the imagination is far more alluring than one that reveals all—but nudity in its proper place seems to her to be something that should be enjoyed, even celebrated. She suffers little from the crises of confidence that she knows affect other women as they age. She has been wearing her skin so long now, and it has hardly changed; indeed, she positively relished the way her body morphed and grew during pregnancy, treasured the stretch marks and the way feeding reshaped her breasts. She has had 275 years in which to accept and love her body, and she does. She therefore quite enjoys Nikola's attention to it, the way he seemingly longs for a peek, the novelty he finds in his enjoyment of it. She doesn't mind his gaze at all, even if...

Even if what? Even if she doesn't want it to go any further? Does she not? Nikola's fingers are working through her hair now, fingertips dragging over her scalp as he combs the conditioner through her hair. He's doing it over the edge of the bath, and by the time he reaches the ends his touch is nothing but a gentle tug on her scalp, and it feels glorious, caring, intimate. He starts at the top again and she feels that the tips of his nails have become pointed, just shy of sharp against her skin. A noise forms in her throat again and she shifts in the water, knee bending and lifting up out of the water as her left hand slips, almost subconsciously, onto her thigh. She can feel the bubbles dissipating, can hear the faint noise of them fading away, replaced by the sound of Nikola's breathing, which is certainly heavier than it was before.

Her _body_ certainly wants something. The water is warm, but not as warm as she is, with his fingers on her skin and his breath tickling over her. This feels like it could be a turning point, could be the beginning, but of what, exactly?

Helen loves Nikola. He told her long ago—very long ago for her, but not so long for him—that he loved her, and at the time she'd been taken aback by it, perhaps even frightened. But now she understands. She saw him in 1901, her second, and again a few times in the years between that meeting and his supposed death in 1948, and in that time they'd forged a bond, one that he had felt years ago but she hadn't fully understood until she'd lived the experiences he had. Now she does, and it's brought them closer. She's come to love him, but...

Nikola will never grow old. Like her, he'll live forever unless someone manages to kill him. There will be no old age, no infirmity to tear them apart, nothing external to pull them away from each other. They know each other, understand each other's passions and fears and defences; accept them. Sex is the only way they don't know each other, and Helen thinks...

Helen thinks she likes it that way.

"I think you're done," Nikola whispers, raking his fingers through her hair one final time. "Your hair will be cleaner and softer than it's been for a hundred years." She feels his nails retract again before he pulls away, moving to the sink again and returning with another jug of warm water. "Sit forward for me so this water doesn't go all over the floor. I don't want to let the ends drape in the bath."

Helen complies, sitting up as much as the heavy cast will allow, and lets him guide her head back again. He lets the ends of her hair sit on her shoulder as he rinses the top, using his hand again to shield the water from her eyes. He refills the jug and lets the water pour over the ends, which she can feel him holding away from the soapy bathwater. After one final refill he rinses her whole head again, working his fingers through her hair to ensure that all traces of the conditioner are washed away. "Stay there," he murmurs, laying the twisted wet tail against her shoulder again and moving away, returning a moment later and gathering her hair up again. "Lean back."

When she does, she feels a towel behind her head, soft and dry, and relaxes against it. Nikola folds it gently around her head, twists the end, then tucks it up to form a turban. 

"There," he whispers, and Helen opens her eyes and looks up at him.

The bubbles are all but gone now, but he's looking at her face. His eyes are soft, all trace of lasciviousness and laughter gone. Helen knows he wasn't unaffected by the sight of her, by the sounds she made and the feel of her. If his lack of witty repartee wasn't evidence enough of that, then the nails would be; his vampire self is usually under tight control—she hasn't known him to lose it even slightly in many, many years. She wants to say something, explain, because he's done so much for her in the past two weeks, and now she's... But she can't quite find the words.

"Nikola," she breathes, and hears it all in her voice, the want and the weight, the certainty and the guilt.

Unexpectedly, he smiles. It's not his usual grin, but something softer, like the look in his eyes. "I know," he murmurs, and there's so much acceptance and mutual understanding in those two words that she feels her good hand snake out of the bath, reaching up toward his. He lets her find it, curls his fingers around hers and squeezes. "We've been dancing around each other for 120 years. Let's keep doing it for a little longer."

He leans down and kisses her cheek, soft and lingering. "Now," he whispers after, voice close to her ear, "you relax, and wash yourself, and do whatever you need to do. When you're dressed, we'll go out and see this place you created." His fingers slip out of hers. "Take your time, I won't be far. I'll be waiting."

With that, he departs, closing the bathroom door quietly behind him. Helen watches him go, hand slipping slowly back into the bath, and she doesn't move for some time. She stares at the door long after he's gone, a small smile on her face, warm in a way that has nothing do with the temperature of the water, nor anything to do with sex.

~FIN~


End file.
